Not presentation related, but something that has been diminishing in recent years, OFCOM is to look at forcing public service broadcasters to increase there spending in original children's productions.
As quoted in the article:
"Between 1998 and 2015, ITV's original children's programming fell from 424 hours a year to just 42, while Channel 5's fell from 353 hours to 30.", though as Matthew Wright (and panel) pointed out on Monday's programme the big decline began when the junk food ban came in. Whilst it will be a good thing, not only for the state of the industry but also to give more competition to the BBC, the big question is where will this extra funding come from?
:-(
A former member
First off, Channel 5 does alot of co productions with other companies. I dont want to sound cynical, but I bet Ch5 owners will just get more new content by moved its production offices from Nick to five and this ticks lots of boxes.
I do agree with ITV at least doubling its output on CITV channel, since ITV claimed back in 2008 ITV PBS was only worth £40million, but since then the company has seen improvements etc so wouldn;t there be some spare cash around?
The closure of the Leeds studios in 2006 (or 2007 or 2008, whenever it was) was pretty much the end of CITV original programming for a good few years until fairly recently. Prior to that there was a large surplus of new commissions on CITV. Even during the budget cut and the ill-fated stripped scheduling era, there were still new programmes.
Not that stripped scheduling was all that successful on CITV the way it was on Nickelodeon, because a lot of what Nickelodeon shows is imported stuff from its American sister with season runs of up to 26 episodes - enough to make a stripped schedule worthwhile as it lasts five weeks, whereas at that time CITV was only commissioning 13 episodes a series.
Of course if there wasn't the presence of CBBC and CBeebies, as the article states, it's quite plausible there would be little or no homegrown children's programming these days.
But of course will the forced investment in children's programming suddenly see the likes of CITV back in the 3:30-5pm slot on ITV? Probably not. They lobbied for years to get it dropped and seem happy to have Tipping Point in that slot instead these days.
I would imagine that Ofcom would be happy with productions airing on the broadcaster's designated children's channels, in the case of ITV they could always argue their main channel airings air on weekend morning (as current, if applicable). I'll be more intrigued to see what Channel 4 do. New younger aimed programmes onto E4, a return of a T4 type slot on weekends, if it airs on channel 4 after Sunday brunch mixed in with the Simpson repeats.
Not presentation related, but something that has been diminishing in recent years, OFCOM is to look at forcing public service broadcasters to increase there spending in original children's productions.
As quoted in the article:
"Between 1998 and 2015, ITV's original children's programming fell from 424 hours a year to just 42, while Channel 5's fell from 353 hours to 30.", though as Matthew Wright (and panel) pointed out on Monday's programme the big decline began when the junk food ban came in. Whilst it will be a good thing, not only for the state of the industry but also to give more competition to the BBC, the big question is where will this extra funding come from?
Thanks for posting. Good to hear that a review is going to be happening. I feel it's important to have British made programming on the PSB commercial channels as an alternative to the BBC's offering.
I do think the reality of todays market means this needs to go beyond the PSBs - it's arguably more important that the commercial childrens channels are producing UK content than the main five terrestrials, and just a couple of series a year would actually significantly increase the commercial childrens content. Based on the figures above a target of an hour a week for ITV and C5 isn't unreasonable at all.
I do think the reality of todays market means this needs to go beyond the PSBs - it's arguably more important that the commercial childrens channels are producing UK content than the main five terrestrials, and just a couple of series a year would actually significantly increase the commercial childrens content. Based on the figures above a target of an hour a week for ITV and C5 isn't unreasonable at all.
I think it's important that high quality content for kids should be on FTA/FTV channels, and not behind a pay wall, though.
If it were the case that all would have to increase home grown productions, I wonder if co commissions would count towards this. Could CITV and Disney team up, with CITV having the free to air rights (similar to the first season of Fort Boyard: Ultimate Challenge)? The obvious case for co commissions would be Channel 5 for Milkshake and Nickelodeon for Nick Jr.
Did the public service broadcasters used to have to air a percentage of educational inspired programmes? I'm just thinking of the science, nature, and documentaries that we used to get on CBBC and CITV.
I do think the reality of todays market means this needs to go beyond the PSBs - it's arguably more important that the commercial childrens channels are producing UK content than the main five terrestrials, and just a couple of series a year would actually significantly increase the commercial children's content. Based on the figures above a target of an hour a week for ITV and C5 isn't unreasonable at all.
I think it's important that high quality content for kids should be on FTA/FTV channels, and not behind a pay wall, though.
While it's important to note that the commercial kids channels should play a part in facilitating the breadth of children's content in the UK, I'm sceptical of how the three main pay TV kids channels would be motivated for that approach. Arguably, their remit has been fulfilled from the plethora of US shows that dominate the schedules.
Paywall or not though - all of the commercial channels should take an interest in producing quality kids programming in the UK.
I remember that the U.K. channels used to (I'm not sure if it is still the case) have a couple of UK productions. Was this a necessity from the regulators or something that the parent companies thought would be a good idea to invest in U.K. productions?
I remember that the U.K. channels used to (I'm not sure if it is still the case) have a couple of UK productions. Was this a necessity from the regulators or something that the parent companies thought would be a good idea to invest in U.K. productions?
I recall Cartoon Network having Skatoony as an original production - and Nickelodeon having House of Anubis. The latter is entirely made up of US programming, while Cartoon Network only has the Amazing World of Gumball to its name. Disney Channel is still dominated by a number of US commissions.
I think it was more of a case of the parent company interest - something that has been dissipating. Hopefully, Ofcom should be making a paramount decision on making sure that kids programmes commissioned in the UK is a priority for the rest of the channels out there.